


The Ice and Virgin Heart

by twistedthicket1



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Complete, Fluff, Johncroft, M/M, Prompt Fill, Umbrellas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-10
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-02-12 12:30:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2110017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twistedthicket1/pseuds/twistedthicket1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>based on a prompt from DawnMasonCullen.</p><p>It all started with an umbrella, left behind as if hastily forgotten. If it had been any one else, John would have accounted it to stress, distracted thoughts. Except this was Mycroft Holmes, and such things did not happen to the British government. Yet he supposed he's used to these things, what with a flatmate that shoots holes in the walls just to get attention...</p><p>John is used to dealing with strange situations and stranger men. The Holmes brothers have ensured as much. What happens though when even ice cracks, and feelings of jealousy threaten to tear apart an already tenuous sibling bond?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Forgotten

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DawnMasonCullen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawnMasonCullen/gifts).



> so this prompt was given to me by DawnMasonCullen. ^_^ the original prompt being: "i'd like one in which mycroft develops a crush (or whatever the mycroft equivalent is) on john. Sherlock is in love with john and he doesn't know it, and sherlock discovers mycroft's crush. Cute possessive love triangle courting things happen"
> 
> I think it will be about three chapters, all in all. I hope you find I wrote the situation well! thank you so much for the prompt! And I'm sorry it took so long to start it! :3

 

 

_Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye~ **H. Jackson Brown Jr.**_

 

 

John had come to accept that there were certain aspects of his life he had no control over. He thought that most of the time, he even did a fairly good job, considering so many parts of his daily routine were so actively shot to hell on a regular basis. He was used to disorder, thrived on chaos, and to a certain extent, lived for the unexpected. After all, for someone who seemed so collected most of the time, he had served in the army for a number of years, at least before the tell-tale gunshot that had ended his career.

So, he'd come to know that just because there was a lack of control in his life, didn't mean that he was completely out of control full stop.

The twelfth time he was kidnapped by Mycroft Holmes however, even John had to admit he was beginning to feel not unlike a chess piece, moved by some invisible hand. He sat at the back seat of the car and did his best not to scowl, despite the fact that he felt personally he had a right to if that's what he wanted. Certainly, Sherlock was for once avoiding getting into trouble (after the last fiasco that had involved a barrel of whipped cream and a border collie that John had grown more attached to than he was willing to admit) so there was no real reason for the elder Holmes to bother him, surely.

After all, John thought bitterly, the least the man could do was buy him a drink first, if this was to become a common habit.

****

To his surprise, he did not find himself at the Diogenes, where most of the meetings with Mycroft up until now had happened. Nor had John found himself in some dodgy hole in the wall, or an empty parking lot. No, this time Anthea (now calling herself 'Alaria') opened the door for him to reveal a small café, cosily sitting in the London rain like a warm refuge amongst a grey sea. For a moment, John was certain he'd been taken to the wrong address, Mycroft's words ringing in his mind in amusement: I also don't frequent cafés.

Regardless, the army doctor was never one to say no to a nice cup of tea, and the rain left him shivering and desperate for a way to warm himself up. He found the elder Holmes seated at the very back of the place, flipping through his phone like he had all the time in the world, immaculate as always in his three-piece suit and tie. He only spared a glance upwards as John sat down across from him, though he did seem to pick up on the man's cold, as he called a server over quickly and asked for a large chai tea.

John didn't bother at this point asking how he knew that he took his tea with milk, Sherlock had already pulled the same stunt so many times that he barely even blinked.

“Decided a change of atmosphere was in order? Or have we just moved past intimidation techniques?” The soldier grinned teasingly as he sat down, a moment later sipping the tea brought to him and smiling in relish. Mycroft appeared nonplussed by the attempt at humour, his light blue eyes coolly flicking over John's form. It was a long stretch of silence that bridged between them, and the army doctor found it ever so slightly outside the range of comfortable. During said silence, the elder Holmes appeared content to merely stare at John, eyes narrowed in what appeared to be calculatingly deep thought. The quiet soon turned from slightly uncomfortable to extremely, and John shifted minutely in his chair, unwilling to break it but unsure of how much longer he could stand bearing the unrestricted weight of the Holmesian gaze. Mycroft's ice-blue eyes appeared nearly colourless, they were so piercing and so entirely masked.  
Then, the elder Holmes spoke. So quietly that John wasn't quite sure that he heard. It was a surprisingly strained whisper, uttered softly into the fold of Mycroft's hands “As I feared, I'm correct.”

John wondered what it might mean, but he did not have the chance to ask. For already the elder Holmes was on his feet, standing. John spun in his chair even as Mycroft left without the barest of glances or goodbyes, some kind of protest or question hovering on the edge of his lips. Yet he found himself silenced, blinking in surprise as he turned back to the table. John found his brow furrowed in confusion, looking incredulously at the cup of tea left to steam, untouched.

For in all the time the army doctor had known the elder Holmes, he had never known Mycroft for one to waste perfectly good Earl Grey. Moreover, the entire situation was less like a kidnapping, and more like a very strange, very short meet-up between friends. Yet perhaps the most peculiar mystery of all, was the abandoned umbrella, lying propped up against the table.

John was used to aspects of his life functioning outside of his control. Living with Sherlock had taken the last of his reservations towards the idea, if the army had left him with any to begin with. Yet there were some things that were constants, some facts that always remained the same.

Mycroft Holmes being forgetful.... Mycroft Holmes forgetting his umbrella....  
To paraphrase a certain detective, John had thought this morning at least that he'd sooner see England fall.

 

****  
“Bored.”

BANG.

John was up out of his chair before he'd even fully processed what he was doing, cursing loudly under his breath even as he marched towards Sherlock's bedroom, fully intent on wrestling his gun away from the lanky figure lying prone on the bed. The detective to his credit put up little resistance as the army doctor wrested the weapon from his possession, turning instead to scowl at the ceiling, cupids bow lips turned in a pout of displeasure.

He did not flinch as John glared at him, clicking the safety on his Browning even as he struggled to grab a hold of his already sparking temper. It simmered in his bones even as he crossed his arms over his chest, his weapon held in one hand as he demanded in exasperation “Do you just have a certain level of boredom in which your personality turns from destructive to homicidal?”

Sherlock didn't seem amused by his analysis, lips pursed into a pout of displeasure. The detective's hands twitched with the restless rhythm of a cat's tail, and his blue eyes were narrowed in reproach. “Dull.” He offered by way of retaliation, turning to glance away and upwards, rolling his eyes and huffing softly. Long fingers toyed with the end of his robe, and the detective glared hatefully in front of him, completely lost in the depths of his sulk. John sighed at the theatrical way in which the man was sprawled, like an overgrown lynx lying out in the sun. Despite what people might think, the army doctor didn't find such things all that adorable. Rather, it was at times much like looking after a toddler, and a particularly vindictive one at that (who also hid cigs in his slippers and could handle weaponry with moderate if careless skill). Still, he could never exactly bring himself to be quite fed up with Sherlock, and John found himself once again sighing and simply putting his gun away, not bothering to badger the detective when he was in such a mood.

Holmeses, completely mad, every single one of them.

John didn't see the way Sherlock's eyes lingered on the soldier's back as he turned, nor how the detective's fingers twitched, raking over the man's jumper.

However, he did notice how Sherlock paused later on in the day from his pacing, blinking owlishly at the black umbrella propped by the door. John casually mentioned Mycroft's strange behaviour from his last meeting, scrubbing away grime from a dirty dish in the sink. He did not look up as he spoke.

“Like he saw a ghost... Don't even know... you suppose England's going to war again?”

It was only half-serious, but the detective's blue eyes narrowed in far too grim a manner for what was meant to be a light-hearted conversation. John missed the way his flatmate's hands clenched. “Something of that manner.” Was all he replied.

****

Mycroft sat in his chair at the Diogenes, hands steepled together in wordless thought. The illumination of his eyes cast a pale glow, as did the tumbler of brandy sitting at his side. All was quiet, save for the racing of the man's mind. Yet uncharacteristically, the elder Holmes found his thoughts not filled with matters of world importance.

No.

Rather, closing his eyes and sighing, Mycroft found with frustration all that lingered was the faint smell of gun oil in his nose, and the taste of tea on his tongue. Foolish, stupid.

Rash.

A meaningless attachment, nothing more.

.... He wished in that moment he had his umbrella, if only to stop the way his hands picked at each other, absent yet constant into the evening.


	2. Gifts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay I haven't returned to this prompt in forever and I am so sorry I am trash like that sometimes and sometimes don't touch things for a super long time :S apologies, however my goal is to finish this one, hopefully by the end of this week. One more chapter to go! ^_^

 

_The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread **~ Mother Teresa**_

 

 

_Mycroft, don’t take what isn’t yours._

The memory came to him, clearer than the rare blue sky that greeted London before him. Mycroft could picture his mother’s voice, faintly scolding. He had been very little, after all, and Sherlock even younger. The elder Holmes brother even when he was younger had struggled with the concept of what was “his” and “not his”.

The memory was clouded by the sickly sweet watermelon flavour of summer, the texture of sticky hands wrapped around the model plane his brother had been playing with only a moment before. In his mind’s eye, Mycroft could picture his younger brother’s face, much rounder and redder than the Sherlock that the rest of the world knew today. He had been an insufferable cryer back then, kicking up a fit that could be heard all across the Holmes’ backyard and echoing through the neighbourhood. People knew when Sherlock was upset, that much the wailing toddler made sure of. The elder brother personally found the whole thing rather unfair, how quickly Mummy was scowling at him, a hand on her hip and tapping her toe with impatience. After all, he had only been looking a little, there was no sense in raising such a fuss. He would have given the plane back eventually, after all.

Apparently though, his mother hadn’t been so reassured by such excuses. The elder Holmes had rather been forced to endure his mother’s frazzled nerves, hunching in budding shame as she’d pointed to the wailing toddler.

_“He’s your brother, Myc, he’s too little to understand that you’re just borrowing. Give it back.”_

But it wasn’t _fair._

Mycroft, reshuffling papers on his desk and faintly smirking at his desk in nostalgia, stopped the memory there. Because really, that’s what it came down to for an eleven year old, how fair things were. Children, as a rule, were governed by the idea of justice and fairness, a preconceived concept of how the world should be shaped, the good guys prevailing and the bad guys locked away for their terrible crimes.

A very simplistic view, all in all. In fact to his eleven year old self, Mycroft had to concede that he himself would likely have been a “bad guy”. Someone the hero would lock away for his crimes, so that he may not harm the public.

Folding his hands in front of his face, the elder Holmes wondered just who that younger version of him would have raised upon a pedestal, then. Someone brave, likely serving their country. Someone who would have sacrificed themselves for their comrades, though that was now what he could only describe as foolishness of the highest order. It didn’t take long for him to find a face, and when he did, the man closed his eyes as though in pain.

_Don’t take what isn’t yours, Mycroft._

It was funny, how that rule could become so grey when it came to the matter of hearts and sentiment.

Perhaps in that way, that was why he was so fond of the nickname Ice Man.

****

_Don’t take my things! Give it back!_

Sherlock, ten years old and possessive of everything that came across his path, had glared up at Mycroft’s imposing height with the burning rage of a tiger. The elder holmes, nineteen and faintly amused by the tormenting of his younger sibling, only lifted the encyclopedia he had snatched from his brother’s hands higher.

“If you would like it, brother mine, then you shall have to become taller.”

The kick to the shins had been admittedly, a bit of a surprise. The red-haired teenager had found himself crumpling like a fallen tree, howling in pain. Over him, Sherlock crowed like a pirate who had snatched precious treasure, kicking his brother once in the stomach for good measure. The little boy’s eyes had been aglow with complete malicious victory.

“Serves you right, _Piecroft!”_ And sticking his little pink tongue out, Sherlock had darted off like a spring before his brother could even catch his breath. Down the hall, his younger brother’s shout of “That’s what happens when you take my stuff!” Could be heard not only by Mycroft, but by a very annoyed mrs Holmes.

Mycroft at the time had merely gritted his teeth, knowing that this time, he was admittedly in the wrong.

Still, the little brat hadn’t needed to _kick_ so damn _hard._

****

On Sherlock’s fifteenth birthday, Mycroft caught Sherlock sleeping with his boyfriend.

It broke Mycroft’s heart, completely besotted as he was with the first person he had ever felt some kind of human connection with, had all but spit in his face, telling him wordlessly that he wasn’t good enough.

Sherlock, barely a teenager and rebellious to begin with, was unrepentant as he was merciless in his jibes. Mycroft, unwilling to put up with it any longer and not ready to hear his brother's excuses, hadn’t even realized when his fist had come around. knocking his brother solidly in the jaw, Sherlock's head snapped back in recoil. He watched his younger brother reel, fall to the ground, blink up at him with a bloodied lip. And the elder Holmes read in Sherlock’s posture, the wide-eyed vulnerability, that his younger brother had actually never intended for it to go that far, to sleep with his brother’s partner.

The elder Holmes, having put up with his brother’s mistakes all of his life, this time could not bring himself to forgive.

It wasn’t until many years later, that Mycroft’s ex confessed to him that he’d coerced the younger Holmes, gotten him drunk on peach schnapps and offered him rather a great deal of money.

Fifteen.

Mycroft wondered why he hadn’t seen it, why he hadn’t known.

He realized only after, when he had tried to get back in touch with Sherlock only to find the address he had for him was false.

Sentiment, clouded reason above all else.

Don’t take what’s mine.

The next time Sherlock said that to him, he was pleading for his stash of cocaine. The elder Holmes promised from that point onward, a silent vow to himself:

He’d never take Sherlock’s things again.

Even at the sacrifice of his own happiness in the process.

Except…

Except now, Mycroft wasn’t exactly sure just where that line lay.

****

John blinked in confusion, almost ninety percent sure that what he was seeing had to be some kind of mass hallucination.

Surely, he had been drugged.

After all, it had happened before, and it made more sense than the sight that was before him.

Sherlock, standing in 221 B with a broom in his hands and a vaguely startled expression, sheepishly looking at John as if he honestly hadn’t noticed he had come in until now. Yet that by itself was perhaps not the most startling sight, as the detective was currently perched in a living-room that looked like it had been scrubbed within an inch of its life. John felt his mouth fall open before he could stop it, looking around in shock. Case notes were resting in organised piles upon the side-table, instead of tacked haphazardly across the walls and connected with bits of string. The floor was actually visible for a change, and John’s feet did not leave rings in a layer of dust any longer. The windows were clear, allowing mellow afternoon sunshine to filter through to shine upon Sherlock’s chair and his own.

In the centre of it all stood the detective, nervously toying with his hands as if he was a school boy suddenly unsure that his cleaning duties of the classroom were up to par.

There was a long, rather awkward pause that carried itself out for far longer than John thought was entirely possible. Then, the army doctor caught himself, clearing his throat carefully before cautiously daring to ask

“...So… What’s… all this then?”

John blinked in surprise when Sherlock’s face, normally so pale, quite suddenly flared as red as a bright tomato. The detective ducked his head, mumbling something rather unintelligible. His hands tightened about the broomstick reflexively, as if he’d very much like to beat himself over the head with it. The image was rather, well, amusing if the army doctor was honest with himself. He found himself grinning, just a little, willing to save Sherlock a little and hand him a raft.

“A case, then?”

The darkly-curled young man seemed to latch onto the excuse, nodding fervently. His mask of calm, normally flawless, was slightly ruffled as he adjusted it, nodding once, sharply in affirmative.

“A killer, he cleans the homes of the victim’s afterwards. I was merely trying to get into his mindset, his ideology.”

John nodded, pretending that he believed the man’s words instead of thinking they were the most feeble excuse to date that he’d ever heard come out of Sherlock’s mouth. Especially since the army doctor had complained not even a week ago that the flat was a complete and utter mess.

Sometimes, the detective really was a good man, underneath all of his usual pomp.

“Well, let’s just say that I wish you could get this kind of serial killer more often, might be useful to have someone obsessed with household chores for a little while around the place. Besides Mrs Hudson, that is.”

With the gentle jibe, the detective’s shoulders seemed to relax. Sherlock looked vaguely relieved, recovering enough to return the joke.

“Says the man who half the time doesn’t even bother putting on tea.”

Mimicking their elderly landlady, John shook his head. “Not your housekeeper.”

And John, seeing Sherlock genuinely smile and laugh, couldn’t help but think to himself that Sherlock was the best friend a man could ever have.

**  
  
**

****

The letter came to John in plain paper, but the weight of the envelope told the army doctor that its worth was more expensive than its simple appearance implied. Addressed to Dr John H. Watson in a delicate scrawl, John at first thought it had to be some kind of mistake.

Usually, this kind of letter was for his flatmate, not him.

Yet Sherlock was currently out of the country, taking a small case over in Scotland that John unfortunately couldn’t join him for, due to a few medical-training meetings he had to attend in order to renew his license.

So, it was with a great deal of confusion that he found himself sitting in his customary chair, prying apart the expensive envelope to reveal milky writing paper, more of the elegant scrawl addressing him. The army doctor frowned in confusion, reading the scrawl and feeling as though he were in the middle of a rather bad movie.

_Dear John,_

__

_At 1:30 today, go to the park near your flat._

_There is a surprise for you._

__

_~ With all my love,  Red_

Red.

John was immediately filled with dread, something prickling at the base of his skull. He didn’t know anyone who called themselves that, and Sherlock was gone… Had something happened to Sherlock while he was gone? Was this “Red” friend or a foe waiting for him in order to use him as bait for the detective??

He didn’t know, but one thing the army doctor was certain of, if Sherlock was in trouble, the army doctor wanted to help. Yet… 1:30 was ten minutes from now, he’d have no time to call the police, call for backup…

Heck, he couldn’t even call Mycroft, as the git’s contact currently read as busy when John tried to thumb the number. Biting his lip, the army doctor had to make a quick decision. He could go and risk it, or not go and possibly risk Sherlock.

It wasn’t even really a question, in the end.

Grabbing his gun, John Watson grimly shrugged the weapon into the waist of his jeans. Whatever it was, threat or friend, he’d just… face it head on.

****

The pen-name came from college, actually.

Mycroft had used it for a journalism job, a way to make himself some money in the early hours of the morning or inbetween classes. People coined him with it for his hair, then less of a dark red and more the colour of a fox’s tail. It had used to be curly, too, although it never quite reached Sherlock’s level of sprawling bird’s nest.

In retrospect, the elder Holmes knew that what he was doing was perhaps not the best way of going about being romantic. Really, he was rather rubbish at the whole “romancing” part of relationships in general, and tended to prefer the company of books even in his teenage years. Still, he counted himself fortunate that according to surveillance, John Watson had taken the bait.

Now all that was left was for the plan to actually work, and he might have a chance.

He ran his hands over his eyes and sighed, feeling the twisting claws of guilt scratching at his insides.

Doing this while Sherlock was away was a low move, truthfully.

But… like _hell_ he was about to clean his brother's flat for someone else.

He was enraptured, but he hadn’t completely lost himself in the process.

Plus, there was the insidious whisper, muttering away in his ear.

_Don’t take what’s mine!_

But… John Watson… could a person really belong to anyone, if they weren’t actually in a relationship?

Somehow, Mycroft considered that the likely answer that would have come from his younger brother, was a resounding yes.

****

John had expected violence, some kind of confrontation in broad daylight.

Instead, he found himself blinking at what had once been a rather run-down park that he had sometimes visited while going out for walks, hardly being able to comprehend what he was seeing before him.

Flowers…

There were…

Well, _Flowers._

and not just… flowers, but a kind that John recognised, knew well. Because, well frankly (and he’d be mortified to say as much) they were… his favourite kind.

Blue delphiniums, to most, a weed and nothing more.

But to John, they reminded him of years spent at his family’s summer cottage, kicking up pond water and running through fields of them. They filled the park, standing proud under the sun warmly, and the army doctor felt himself sway, utterly and completely floored and amazed.

His gun forgotten, the army doctor reached out for one of the bushes, plucking a flower to hold in his hands. The petals felt delicate in his hands, as if a single crushing blow could end them. Something warm filled John’s chest, and he wasn’t sure why, but he felt as if he might cry. After all, who would _ever_ …? For well, someone that was just... him?

A tug on his sleeve, and John was looking down at a small boy, homeless probably from his clothes. In his hands he clutched another envelope, fingerprints leaving little dirty smudges. He handed the letter to John without a word, tearing away after a butterfly a moment later. This time, the army doctor was quick to open the letter, opening its contents to reveal a simple message.

Still, it filled him with more confusion than he ever thought possible.

_Thank you for coming. Go back now to your detective and your mysteries, I wish you the best._

__

_~ Red_

What kind of mysterious villain, thanked someone for merely arriving to see their surprise? What's more, what type  _wanted_ John to return to Sherlock, the arguable enemy of most of London's underground?

Apparently, John mused, not a villain after all.

 **  
**A good guy though, he still wasn’t entirely sure.


	3. Alone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah I know... I said this would be the final chapter >.> it was turning out to be far too long though. So, one more than expected. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy ^.^ this is turning into "everyone is in love with everyone else" the musical :D but with less song and dance numbers...

 

 

 

_Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind. **~ William Shakespeare (A Midsummer Night's Dream)**_

 

 

With the gift of the mysterious flowers, John found himself looking out with a cautious kind of optimism. However, no other presents made themselves known, and soon Sherlock came back to _**221 B**_ with a billow in the length of his coat and a monologue of deductions to do with his latest case. John sat and listened to them, basking in the warmth of that ridiculously sharp tongue, half of his mind still on the flowers and the mystery behind it all. A part of him wanted to ask his friend, see if the detective could shed light on the situation, yet a greater part of himself urged him to keep his silence. It wasn’t that John didn’t trust Sherlock, no the army doctor would without hesitation believe and follow his companion to the bitter end, it was the fact that Sherlock had a rather annoying habit of destroying John’s love life. The man seemed to take a perverse pleasure in ensuring that he end up alone, and though the army doctor was aware that part of it was due to the detective’s rather jealous nature of anything he declared his own, he would rather that his enigmatic flatmate not scare the new potential love interest out of the picture before they’d even made themselves known.

So John kept his silence, instead watching as the detective’s face became lively an animated with the thrill of the proverbial hunt, and in between bouts of deduction chanced a glance at the bouquet of small wildflowers he’d picked from the park, sitting innocently upon the side table of the living room.

****

Greg Lestrade was not one to judge another on their love life. He had been married, and then later divorced after the affair, and before that had been a bit of a flirt himself, having enjoyed his youth thoroughly before the Yard had called to him and encouraged his younger self to clean up their act.

However, even he had to admit that this… latest crush was a rather unhealthy endeavour.

Leave it to him to wind up figuring out that he was in love with Sherlock Bloody Holmes the moment someone who actually caught the detective’s interest came along. That had been the D.I’s sinking deduction the night he had seen the army doctor, or rather, seen the way the curly-haired detective’s eyes had tracked the unassuming man all throughout the case with the pink phone. Like a rather besotted puppy, and God, at the time Lestrade had felt a rather painful twinge alight in his chest, coupled with a mixed up sort of parental relief.

The thing was, Greg Lestrade could admit that he was rather attracted to Sherlock Holmes, but he could also realise that first and foremost, his protective instincts revolved around the man. He supposed that it was in part due to the fact that when he had first known the detective he had been a strung out kid living out on the streets. The night that the D.I had found the man had been a bitter winter, rain coming down in sheets and threatening to freeze anything and anyone who wasn’t safely tucked away. Greg had stumbled upon Sherlock while admittedly on patrol for another suspect, had almost literally tripped over him, hidden away as he was in the shadows of the alley the man had been investigating. Naturally, the detective hadn’t exactly responded to being nearly tripped over well, shooting out half slurred but no less caustic accusations and deductions. Lestrade, to his credit, had resisted his initial urge to kick the man in retribution, instead kneeling to get a closer look at the quivering junkie curled upon the pavement.

Sherlock at the time had been bone-thin, his curls thick and matted to his scalp with sweat and grime. His face had been so dirty that his eyes had appeared as if they glowed out from his features, and his teeth had been bared in ferality. Little more than a teenager, but christ Lestrade had seen the brilliance in that gaze, even clouded as it was by drug and hunger and sleeplessness.

It was that brilliance in the end, that lead the D.I to pulling the young man to his feet. Well that, and the fact that Sherlock’s way of insulting him for tripping over him was to deduce Lestrade's occupation, general I.Q, _and_ the rickety state of his relationship status (Another fight with Lila, God help him).

Greg had found a strange warm fill his chest that evening when against his better judgement, he had loaned some of his clean clothing to Sherlock, offering his shower for use. The detective had held no such sentimentalities of course, choosing to repay the man by stealing the loose change on the table as well as at least a week’s worth of food, but Lestrade hadn’t really been able to make himself care.

Not when he’d also caught Sherlock before his departure curled up on his sofa, painfully thin and vulnerable, dead asleep out of exhaustion with the bird’s nest of curls he’d later be known for around the yard mussed and wet and freshly cleaned.

That softness, though difficult to discover in the detective, well hidden as it was under a layer of sarcasm and brutal, cruel belligerence, was a gem that Lestrade strove to uncover upon his later interactions with the younger Holmes.

For a long time, he wondered if he’d be the only one to ever catch a glimpse of it, if the detective was truly too good at hiding it for his own welfare.

Then John Watson came, and Lestrade found a part of his world crumbling, and yet another part being strengthened, reassured.

Trust Sherlock Holmes to fall in love with a man so utterly and completely his opposite.

And _oh_ , how Greg watched his friend fall hard and fast, from the first time that invalidated army doctor had opened his mouth and breathed a cherished _“Fantastic, Brilliant, Amazing.”_

It had been at once both beautiful, and utterly devastating for Greg to watch. For John, though a true friend and a wonderful mate, did not return Sherlock’s feelings. Though at first Greg had his doubts, thinking that surely something must be conspiring between the two, regular pub nights with John had quickly revealed that the army doctor was more or less straight, and more than that did not view Sherlock as anything other than a friend.

This realisation both sent a guilty thrill of satisfaction through Greg, as well as a pang of aching pity for the detective. John loved Sherlock, he did, but it wasn’t the love that the D.I could see Sherlock wanted. _Needed_ yes, but that was perhaps a different argument altogether. The simple truth of the matter was, John would likely never come to realise his best friend’s feelings, and Greg, selfishly he supposed, would not be the one to say anything. So the game of silence went on, no one admitting their feelings, and though it was not ideal, Greg thought to himself that perhaps it was for the best, if only so that no one truly ended up bitter and unhappy in the end. After all, Lestrade rather liked John, thinking him a good influence on Sherlock, as well as a loyal and steadfast acquaintance. He had no desire to create any kind of conflict, especially not between his two likely closest friends at work (one of which he happened to be besotted with, admittedly).

It was on such a pub night that John came to greet him, the Saturday warm for spring, and as such the bar was filled with bodies pressing against one another and voices jostling for conversation room. The two men found themselves a darkened niche of a table towards the back, the two of them sitting across from one another and quickly ordering a drink each. If Greg noticed how John seemed rather preoccupied by his beer, he chose not to comment on it right away. He had found that with the army doctor, sometimes silence was the best lubrication that could be used on the man’s mouth, and coupled with something alcoholic, that theory held true tonight.

It was with quiet consideration of the rings that decorated the polished wood of the booth that John coughed awkwardly, eyebrows lowering in consternation before he shyly brought himself to ask whatever it was that was haunting his mind.

When he did speak, Greg had to force himself not to drop his drink, halfway as it was to his lips.

“I… Have you ever had a secret admirer, Greg?”

The D.I, managing to swallow the beer that had been sitting in his mouth without choking, felt the first inklings of heavy dread settle in his stomach. He did not like where this conversation was leading. Still, he managed a small, likely wobbly smile and tried for humour.

“Can’t say that I have, least not since elementary school. Becky Jones, put candied hearts in my locker every day for almost three months.”

John smiled at the childish tale, but his blue eyes were still distracted, far away. Nervous hands drummed against the table-top, and Lestrade scritched the back of his neck with indecisive digits even as he chanced to ask

“Any particular reason you asked?”

The army doctor seemed to hesitate, tongue running over his teeth as if he were tasting his next words. His voice held in it a note of reluctant admittance.

“...Someone’s… been trying to get my attention as of late. I don’t know who, but… _someone._ ”

With that somewhat lame explanation, John folded his hands together, biting his lip and sighing sharply through his teeth. He caught sight of Lestrade’s rather puzzled expression and rushed to explain, clarifying through detail.

“They’re not dangerous, fairly certain of that. But…back when Sherlock left for that case a while ago I received a letter and… a gift.”

Lestrade’s brows rose almost comically, dark eyes glinting in bemusement as he asked _“Gift?”_

With John’s serious nod, the silver-haired man leaned closer, unconsciously picking up on the gravity of his friend’s situation. A part of Greg whispered to him mutinously that his interest was not purely out of idle concern for John. He chose to ignore that side of it pointedly.

“A gift.” The army doctor repeated somewhat uneasily, fingers tapping the side of his glass. Something akin to embarrassed pleasure was crawling along in the form of a blush along John’s neck and the tips of his ears, and his voice softened slightly as he admitted “A rather… sweet one, at that. They knew me… or know me I guess, fairly well.”

_**Sherlock.** _

The jealous little whisper in Greg’s ear caused a coil of guilt to twist through the D.I’s stomach, his jaw clenching automatically. It had to be Sherlock, finally attempting to get John’s attention. If the army doctor couldn’t figure out right away just who it was, it had to be someone of relatively high intelligence, and someone who knew the man personally, if the shyly pleased expression on the army doctor’s face was anything to go by. Lestrade felt his heart if possible sink down into his toes.

“Do you have any idea who it might be?” He found himself asking when he could once again find his words. John’s head shook a negative, and some of the tight, fickle squeezing in Lestrade’s chest lessened if only a bit.

“No clue.” the blonde stated somewhat mournfully “All I know is that they use the penname _Red_ and that I don’t think they’re an enemy of Sherlock’s trying to bait me. Beyond that… I haven’t the foggiest idea. I don’t want to tell Sherlock either, else he’d want to meddle, and I’m afraid truthfully of scaring the admirer off.”

Greg, both at once pained and selfishly relieved, found himself nodding quietly. Telling Sherlock, chances were Sherlock was behind all of this. The man could at times be strangely, stubbornly romantic as well as obtuse, and wouldn’t have necessarily realised that John in some ways needed things to be shown to him bluntly, in order to understand.

In some ways, anonymous gifts were both the best and the worst way to go about it with the ex army doctor. At least, so long as the suitor chasing after him had no intention of revealing themselves.

The insistent, selfish voice in Greg’s mind prayed that in this scenario, that was the case. He tried not to hate himself too much for the thought even as he got John’s mind off the gift by ordering him another drink.

****

It was nearly a week later when John found a package addressed to him on the front step of _**221 B.**_ The man tried not to let the sight of it cause his heart to jump into his throat like he was some kind of silly teenager, although he did hasten his steps a bit even as his fingers thumbed the edge of an envelope attached to the packages’ top. The same, expensive paper was proving to be a familiar texture under John’s fingertips, and as he opened the envelope with baited breath, he found himself recognising the elegant scrawl as the same as before.

Red apparently wasn’t finished with their letter-sending.

_Put the puzzle together, John Watson, and you will find the prize at the end of the trail_

__

_-Red_

__

Puzzle? What could the person possibly even _mean_? John found himself scowling down at the letter, irked but curious about his admirer’s coyness.

“Simple invite out to tea would have done it.” He found himself muttering, but still the army doctor knelt, opening the box without much trouble by picking apart the tape sealing it shut on the edges.

What he found made John’s eyebrows lower in confusion.

A simple golden band, a ring left in a pile of soft packing peanuts. John took it out, holding it up to the light. Squinting, he could see a small engraving.

_No Man is an island._

Now, John wondered, just what could that even mean?

****

Puzzles.

Even as a child, Mycroft had always been making puzzles, if only to keep his younger brother busy.

Of course, the puzzle he had currently created for John was in fact, perhaps ludicrously simple by Holmesian standards, though still challenging for the average british citizen. It held in it many layers, yes, but ultimately it was not any more difficult than the word games that he and Sherlock used to play as children, sending one another coded letters and messages in order to hide things from mummy.

Their father had been surprisingly good at them, for such a simple man.

Mycroft rather had the feeling for some reason that John, despite his obvious protests and annoyance, might have a knack for them as well. At least, the more selfish side of him could hope.

****

It was the third time this month that Lestrade caught Sherlock hiding from John with a cigarette lit between his lips and an expression that was a mixture of pain and confusion.

Greg wondered if it was because the detective was realising that his best friend at times had a skull thicker than a brick wall, when it came to Sherlock’s feelings.

Sherlock didn’t react aloud upon spotting Greg, but he did curl slightly inward upon himself, as if ashamed about the smoke he was currently nursing. Lestrade to his credit didn’t chastise the man, instead holding out one of his own, the familiar nickname lilting off of his tongue.

“Got a light, Sunshine?”

“I am well past my teenage years, Graham.” The detective drawled by way of response, though his nimble fingers dipped into the folds of his coat, revealing a light blue lighter that he tossed to the D.I. “I think I’m well past the age in which nicknames are applicable.”

Greg lit his cigarette, the curling smoke drifting past his ears lazily. He inhaled, exhaling out a foggy cloud before replying. His words were warm in the cold spring air.

“You’re still just a bundle of positivity, so I don’t think the names going away anytime soon. Not to mention _you_ can’t even bother to get my name right, most times.”

The darkly-curled man didn’t grin, but his cupid’s bow lips twitched minutely, the equivalent of a full-blown smirk. Greg grinned, unable to help the joy that filled him at the sight. Really, getting Sherlock to even so much as laugh sometimes was like pulling teeth. It was a feat not many were capable of, save for three people: Himself, Mrs Hudson, and John.

Yet like the detective could read his mind, at the thought of the ex-army doctor Greg watched the smile shrink from Sherlock’s face, his eyes instead turning brooding and stormy. He sighed, and it was a sound that was so human, vulnerable and wistful that Lestrade found his chest twisting itself into knots. Against his more selfish desires, he asked.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

Stubborn, prideful creature that he was, Sherlock looked for a moment like he’d rather not answer. His jaw was clenched, and he flicked the ashes from his cigarette in an uncharacteristic display of nerves. Finally, the detective spoke, and his dulcet voice was a growl of frustration as he admitted his inner doubts.

“There’s someone taking John… taking him away from me.” And it was such a quiet, angry and bitter snarl that Lestrade all but felt his heart wrenching into two. Sherlock, seeming to have deflated, rubbed at his face as if exhausted. His voice was barely more than a murmur as it revealed his greatest insecurity.

“If John goes… I’m… I’m alone. He wouldn’t… he _refused_ to come on the case today. Said he was busy. Then I found letters...”

 

He wrinkled his nose, as if the idea of someone else distracting John, fascinating him was abhorrent. 

Lestrade could have said nothing. Could have preserved the peace. Frankly he was still reeling from the fact that John’s suitor wasn’t in fact, Sherlock. But the man felt a part of him physically _hurting_ at his friend’s words, and damn it all, it wasn’t like he had anything else to lose exactly.

At least, that was how he managed to convince himself to drop his cigarette, step forward, and utterly shock the detective by wrapping his arms around him in a bone-crushing hug. Sherlock, wide-eyed and vulnerable and and staring, looked at Greg as the man pulled away as if he had lost his mind, or if he were participating in a lucid dream. Still, the darkly-curled man felt something pleasant shiver over him with Lestrade’s gentle touch, cupping the back of his neck. The older man’s dark brown eyes were livid, but it wasn’t with fury. And oh, Sherlock absently realised. _Oh._

Greg’s pupils were dilated.

“You _idiot_.” The D.I growled, and the detective found himself not even finding it strange at all that somehow, Lestrade’s lips met his own.

 **  
**Instead, he was rather surprised to find that a small part of him had been waiting for it all along.


	4. Riddle Solved

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there will be an epilogue which shall also be posted tonight ^.^ It shall be a bit smuttier, though not explicit. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this story :) if you have a prompt for me, don't hesitate to either message me or hit me up at my tumblr: twistedthicket1.tumblr.com

  


 

_Fear and Courage are brothers~ **Terri Guillements**_

 

 

 

_No man is an island…_

 

John went over the words again, twisting them metaphorically over and over again in his mind even as he sat in front of his laptop, hands folded under his chin together, tightly interlaced.

He sat upon the park bench that he so often frequented, staring into nothing as he focused on the riddle. A part of him was starting to admit that he was more than just slightly becoming obsessed with it. Okay, highly obsessed. Bordering truthfully on unhealthily obsessed.

 

If this was what Sherlock felt when tracking down the clues to a particularly scintillating case, well then John perhaps sympathised with the man just a bit more strongly than he would have once upon a time. Sighing, he noted the time and stood stiffly, realising that he had been away from the flat for nearly two hours. It was approaching evening, and his mad detective tended to chafe if someone wasn’t around to listen to him ramble.

 

The thought caused a small smile to flit across John’s face. Even if he couldn’t find out who his admirer was, perhaps it was for the better. Though many assumed he loved Sherlock romantically, John’s feelings for the man were anything but. Rather, his affection was stronger, closer to blood brothers, or a fellow soldier in arms. Any relationship John had would likely suffer, as a result.

 

Sherlock would likely always come first, and realistically, there was very little the good doctor could do to stop that.

 

When he came to the flat and realised its emptiness, he considered the fact quietly that perhaps his friend had a new case, something interesting dropped by Lestrade.

 

John couldn’t have known that at that moment, the DI and detective were indeed together… just not exactly discussing work so much as they were desperately trying to see how quickly they could rip one another’s clothes off.

 

Funny, how things could sometimes turn out like that.

 

****

Mycroft was beginning to lose hope that his riddle would ever be solved. He hadn’t wanted to make it too easy on John, lest he insult the good doctor’s intelligence. Yet a part of him had wanted to see if the man would be up to the challenge, if he could piece two and two together and if Sherlock, for all of his faults, had rubbed off on him.

 

Yet as days passed and the hours ticked by, the elder Holmes was beginning to wonder with a sinking feeling if he had misjudged John Watson’s intelligence.

Worse, what if he hadn’t, and the army doctor merely couldn’t reciprocate his feelings?

The thought against Mycroft’s will sent something unpleasant shooting through him. Feeling vaguely ill, he allowed himself to text Anthea, asking her to clear his schedule so he might leave work early.

 

He would be no good to anyone in this state, this place which foolish _sentiment_ had brought him too.

 

The thought filled him with a burning chagrin. Had it really been only a few weeks ago that he had accused Sherlock of sentiment? A cardinal sin, but it seemed that even the elder Holmes had fallen. Sighing through his teeth, Mycroft rubbed tired hands over his eyes.

 

And nearly jumped out of his skin when his phone blipped in the silence of his office, alerting him to a text.

His heart pounded faster when he saw it was from John.

 

_Do you know where Sherlock’s swanned off to? - JW_

 

Mycroft, ignoring the way his chest tightened at the fact that the object of his affections so readily mentioned his brother. The jealousy was petty, but it reared indignantly, a rather ugly dragon twisting inside. The elder Holmes’ answer was perhaps a bit more childish than he might have liked.

 

_**Am I now my brother’s keeper?- MH** _

 

John, ever-quick to deal with sarcasm with snark of his own, answered sharply.

 

_You act like it, most times.- JW_

 

The government official couldn’t help but groan aloud at how pathetically, even John being tetchy seemed to cause something foolish and warm to bubble in his chest. Was there no mercy any more? A part of him wondered if he might just give up upon the thrice-damned riddle, invite the good doctor to grab a coffee with him, or tea. Still, his cowardice was becoming an evident problem, growing the longer that he was forced to sit, to think.

 

He must have taken longer than usual to reply, because a moment later, the army doctor texted back again.

 

_Seriously Mycroft, I’m beginning to get a little worried. -JW_

 

Swallowing his nervousness, the elder Holmes paused to check his personal access to the CCTV footage, and nearly dropped his phone and horror and surprise.

Then again, the sight of his brother being in the midst of a rather… compromising position was the last thing the man’s already-frazzled nerves needed.

 

While Mycroft was trying to get his brain back online from its self-imposed (And frankly horrified) mental shutdown, his phone blipped on the floor. Instinctively reading the text upside down, the elder Holmes couldn’t help but let out the weakest of chuckles.

 

_Holmses. Why are you lot never around when you’re needed?- JW_

 

****

 

It was nearly saturday afternoon before Sherlock came home. An entire night spent out, with very little contact save for one text John received in the evening telling him that the detective was _“In the midst of an experiment”_. Whatever that meant.

 

The army doctor had spent much of the night once again trying to muse over his riddle, but was gradually beginning to lose hope. John had tried internet research, Google and the like, famous islands or books to do with islands. Anything that might give him some kind of name, an address, something.

 

Nothing, save for the fact that the longer John stared at the person’s handwriting, the more he was beginning to suspect that his admirer was male. Something in the curvature of the L’s, the lack of decoration to it. Of course, that was stereotyping, and what’s more, badly-made assumption. Sherlock Holmes (if the git ever got home) would have rolled his eyes at the absurdity. Yet John’s gut didn’t often fail him, and the army doctor’s blue eyes scanned the handwriting and couldn’t help but nod. Male, indeed.

 

When the detective did finally come around the flat, John was very surprised to find that Sherlock seemed uncharacteristically… nervous. The man’s normally impeccable long coat looked rather… rumpled under John’s scrutiny, and his hair though brushed appeared as if it had been raked through by shaking hands. Yet what made the pieces click together for John, was that he knew well the expression that crossed a person’s face when they were trying to hide a walk of shame.

 

When Sherlock realized John was standing in the living room as he came in, their eyes met momentarily. For just an instant, Sherlock turned as red as a seventeen year old after their first romp in uni. John felt his jaw drop in dumbfounded shock.

 

The detective, seeing the expression, if possible turned redder before smoothing his fact with some difficulty into impassiveness. Yet the damage had been done, the army doctor felt a wicked grin of complete disbelief ticking up the corners of his mouth.

 

_“Sherlock.”_

 

Like he’d been shot, the detective took a nervous step back. It was not often that John had the gleeful opportunity to get such a reaction from the detective, and like a greyhound scenting blood, the army doctor was determined to get to the heart of his growing suspicion. Not halting his approach, John arched an eyebrow, running his tongue along his lips as he teased softly.

 

“What happened to “I’m married to my work?””

 

Sherlock, jaw tightening minutely, straightened. His voice had the calm cool of someone placing down a very well-made bluff.

“I’m sure you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

“Mm, nope. Try again, grew up with Harry, remember. She used to pull that one all the time when she was away with her girlfriend of the week.”

The detective scowled, irritation pushing away his embarrassment. His shoulders hunched defensively, even as his voice was cutting and cruel. Sherlock could be mean, when he didn’t want someone to pry.

Luckily, John was rather used to it that tactic of avoidance.

 

“Does it concern you? That I’ve decided to pursue a relationship? Really John, now moving onto the role of mother hen as well as flatmate? I expected more from you, not that I should have, what with your tendency to butt into everyone’s life-”

 

“ _Alright,_ alright.” John raised his hands in surrender, annoyance making the fight not as worth it as it had been at one time. The army doctor turned towards the kitchen, his intent to go make tea, pausing only as his determination got the better of him. Sherlock at times was a bit of a child, and as such, John felt a certain amount of protectiveness towards the man. It had gotten him in trouble a few times, admittedly. Well, more than a few times. Irene Adler and the confusion, jealousy and admittedly rage at her death and Sherlock’s subsequent evident depression…

 

Well, he told himself he had a right to at least ask.

 

“This serious, then?”

 

There was a beat, a pause of breath, as if Sherlock himself were deciding how to answer. In the end, the detective merely nodded, suddenly showing some of his youth in the softness of his eyes, the tilt of his head. John jerked his chin downwards in response, automatically falling into parade’s rest. A soldier’s stance, addressing his comrade. Without looking at the man directly, John softly inquired “Someone I know?”

 

Again, a hesitant nod. Sherlock’s deep baritone rumbled, the sound slightly frayed at the edges “John-”

“Do you want me to leave?” And the question, painful enough to cause the army doctor’s chest to tighten painfully, came out without his entire permission. Left hand shivering slightly, John squared his shoulders against the answer, whatever it might be. Surely, it would be normal, for the detective to expect as much, if it was serious. It was Sherlock’s flat, after all, and John wouldn’t want to intrude, not on a new and potentially serious endeavour.

 

It would be for the better, at least for his friend. It was this thought that made it bearable even asking.

What John hadn’t been expecting, was the furious hiss of breath that Sherlock unleashed through pursed lips. Out of the corner of his eye the army doctor saw the man move, but he hadn’t expected one impossibly long limb to reach out, spin him around. John didn’t have a chance to think before in the cage of Sherlock Holmes’ arms, he found himself locking eyes with his best friend. Fiercely intelligent, angry blue eyes burned into his own, and though John didn’t often notice the height difference between Sherlock and himself, it now seemed heavy and oppressive.

 

The detective’s voice was deadly soft.

“I will only say this _once_ , John so do me a favour and listen with more than just your ears as usual. I am not… I am not prone to sentiment.” John did indeed listen, his eyes perhaps a bit wider than usual at his friend’s uncharacteristic show of sentiment.

 

“John. I… for a long time, I have indeed thought myself married to my work.” The detective seemed to fumble for a moment, something uncertain flickering in the depths of his irises. Taking a deep breath as if to steady himself, he pressed on. “I thought myself alone until you came to me, half-broken yourself and seeking excitement. I took you in, thinking it a favour to you… yet it turned out very quickly that you brought into my life something I would have likely never found for myself, not without panicking, rejecting it outright.”

“What?” John breathed softly, unable to understand, no, not wanting to. Sherlock, shaking his head slightly as if hardly daring to believe it, smiled. It was a small, true and crooked thing.

 

“The ability to _feel_ , John. And the knowledge, that, people have been by my side all along.”

 

Finally releasing his bruising hold, Sherlock stepped back. With the movement, he seemed to sag slightly, as if the tension that had run along his shoulders since his entrance to the flat, or perhaps much longer, had finally left him in a rush. His voice was quiet, so quiet. Yet it was filled with such happiness, that John felt something warm in his chest fill him, past the ache of the potential rejection he had feared.

 

“John Watson, you are one fixed point in a changing age, and I need you, to be that beacon of light. You’re my… my best…”

He faltered then, and John, throat tight tried to finish for him.

 

“Man?” He uttered.

It was right at the moment that Sherlock stated, utterly filled with conviction.

_“Friend.”_

 

And in that moment, both men knew that neither had any plans on leaving the other.

Even if nothing romantic might ever come between them. Their friendship when it came down to it, was far more intimate and stronger than any sexual relationship could ever hope to be.

 

And Sherlock found he was... strangely okay with it.

 

Of course, the rather happy moment ended when the detective flatly admitted “Lestrade.”

 

John, to his credit, only groaned slightly in horror. He ran a hand over his eyes as if shielding his sight from that mental image.

“Christ, _now_ who will I bitch to on pub nights behind your back?”

 

Sherlock was just happy that in all of his blundering, he hadn’t lost the warmth of John’s smile when it was directed solely at him.

 

****

 

_“No man is an island.”_

 

Sherlock straightened even as he read the painfully obvious riddle, sighing at his brother’s complete transparency and worse, John’s oblivious nature. Looking over at his flatmate, the detective clucked his tongue along the roof of his mouth in contemplation. On the one hand, he could lie…

 

Yet on the other, he knew John was practically aching to know just who had been working so hard to gain his attention. Lazy brother, not even bothering to stop and think that John wasn’t much one for riddles. Too literal-minded for them, in many ways. No, he should have done a cipher, or some sort of military code. This… John had no hope of understanding.

 

“Are you aware that many family surnames have meanings behind them?”

 

The detective asked nonchalantly, happily accepting the warm cup of earl grey John set before him after the kettle boiled. The army doctor nodded slowly, brows drawn together in confusion as he tried to make the link the detective was currently presenting.

 

Sherlock, ever fond but fed up with his friend, rolled his eyes at the blank expression greeting him.

“Watson- Son of Walter, originally. Undoubtedly a name that rises from a bastardisation of _Wealdhere_. Your family likely at one point ran some kind of metal-shop.”

 

Blinking slowly, John ran the name in his mind, nodding his head in comprehension. Still, he did not find himself completely sure of what exactly Sherlock was implying.

His friend looked at him with a mixture of disbelief and pity, irritation plain on his features. Sherlock, abandoning his tea and standing, walked over to the mantel. His elegant fingers shuffled around errant papers with impatient energy. Stalling. John got the sense that his friend, as much as he wanted to state the answer to his riddle outright, also felt it John’s duty to solve it. For Sherlock to actually bother to restrain himself at all, his admirer must have been someone the detective actually knew. Something flickering at the back of John’s thoughts, the army doctor tried to deduce it aloud.

 

“Island, then. Their… surname means an island, or something to do with it…”

 

Sherlock did not verify nor deny John’s tentative conclusion, although his head did tilt to the side in a calculating way. The army doctor, rising from his seat to go hunt down his laptop, quickly typed into google. So absorbed he was in the process, he barely noted how the detective continued his long stare, something soft in Sherlock’s features.

 

_He will be good for him, for Mycroft._

 

The detective would never admit to voicing said thought, but it still sat between him and his blogger, and it felt like a sort of goodbye regardless of their earlier promises.

 

_A conductor of light._

 

Privately, Sherlock considered the fact that his elder brother had truthfully spent far too long in the darkness to be healthy for anyone. If _he_ thought as much, surely, it had to be true.

 

John didn’t hear the detective as he slipped towards the refuge of his room, his thoughts instead focused on all the possible permutations of the word _island._

  


****

 

_Holm._

 

Plural, _Holmes,_ meaning an islet, especially near a river or mainland.

 

John leaned back, his heart suddenly thudding twice as quickly, his mouth dry.

_Holmes._

 

But… not Sherlock. Not if he was already entangled with Lestrade. The thought… John wasn’t sure what to think. How to feel.

 

Then:

_Red._

 

Red hair. Behind the doctor’s closed lids, he saw the shock of auburn that was Mycroft Holmes’ hair, imagining how it must have looked when he was younger, likely fox-red and brilliant like a flame.

 

Shit.

 

**Shit.**

 

_No man is an island._

 

And John feels very, very stupid all of a sudden, because he knows the handwriting of the letter, has known it because it was written on the bloody receipt of the coffee he’d gotten off the man all those weeks ago, written on all of the files pertaining to Sherlock that John has read (and God, he’s read a lot of them).

 

Mycroft _bloody_ Holmes.

 

Apparently not so much an ice man as someone uncomfortably, terribly _shy._

 

And though that did not fit into John’s idea of the man, he was finding his mental schema for the elder Holmes rapidly shifting, changing over. It was a sensation he was not, truthfully, entirely comfortable with. It was as if his world was tilted, suddenly put on an angle that made the good doctor want to slip, slide into confusion and chaos.

 

Mycroft Holmes.

 

John wasn’t sure how to feel, only that his mind kept lingering back on those flowers, and the way Mycroft had looked at him at the coffee shop, grey eyes sharp and piercing and so, _so_ lost.

The same expression Sherlock had worn when speaking of Lestrade. Similar to a fault.

As if the poor man had found himself rather struck down by the force of a massive, speeding freight train.

 

****

 

_Coffee?- JW_

_**… Is Sherlock okay?-MH** _

__

_… It’s not Sherlock I want to talk about.-JW_

****

**_...John?-MH_ **

_Hi, Red. I’d like to get to know you, if you’ll let me that is.- JW_

**_… I’d… I’d like that.-MH_ **

**_… You like tea, though. So. Tea?- MH_ **

_  
…Sounds Fantastic. Btw, I’ll bring your umbrella. -JW _


	5. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end ^.^ Greg and Sherlock's POV takes place right after Greg kissed Sherlock :)

 

 

 

 _True love, to whom my heart is prey,_  
_How dost thou hold me in thy sway,_  
_That in each day I find no fault_  
_But daily wait for love's assault._ _~ **Pernette du Guillet**_

 

 

The kiss was meant to be chaste, something that could be rejected, or reciprocated, if desired. Instead, Greg found himself putting enough pressure into it to be bruising, claiming, and utterly possessive. He had been trying to gather the courage to do this for years, and like hell was he going to not get his courage’s worth if this was not going to pan out.

 

Sherlock froze into it, lips unmoving underneath the DI’s. It might have been as good as kissing a stone statue, as the man didn’t even seem to be breathing. All of said hesitation however lasted only an instant, a microscopic length in comparison to what came next. For the detective, once he had gathered his thoughts together, began to kiss Greg back, and it was equally brutal, filthy and wet and completely, utterly, perfect.

 

Neither were entirely sure when they looked back on it who hailed the cab, but Lestrade could vividly remember the ride back to his flat, or rather the heat of it. Hands reaching out, touching and Sherlock’s eyes, almost shy but not shy enough to stop reaching out. Lestrade wanted to kiss away that shyness, that hesitation. He wanted Sherlock as he knew he would be when he was confident- utterly demanding, needy.

 

That came once they reached the safety of Greg’s flat. The cabbie had glared at the two as they had gotten in, wary of heavy petting turning into a free for all in the back of his cab, but now that they were free from the risk of a fine Lestrade had no such compunctions. Sherlock for his part didn’t seem to mind, pausing only in the dance between kissing and tasting and touch to allow Greg access to his flat’s keys, the door parting to let them inside easily. In the shadow of the flat, Sherlock’s hair looks ringed with silver, his eyes made of moonshadow, and his lips are red and plump and inviting. There is a kind of desperation about him, a wildness, and it shoots something tingling through Greg, a frisson of heat down his spine and towards his groin. It only increases when as the door closes the detective chooses to close in once again, pinning the D.I to the door and tracing the curvature of the man’s jaw with his nose, then lips, then tongue. The sensation was maddening, causing shivers to alight through Greg. His hands groped for purchase, finding it in the loops of Sherlock’s belt.

 

As he hooked his fingers into them both men found heat and warmth pressing hard against each other’s hips. Sherlock groaned, the sound small and low. It was a noise of need.

Greg found himself hoping against hope that he got to be the only other person who would get to hear that sound for the rest of his existence.

 

When they fucked, Sherlock found himself holding on to anything he could reach of the D.I. Shoulders, mostly, his nails digging in and scratching.

 

In that moment, his thoughts were no longer on John, but on how he could have possibly almost missed seeing the detective inspector’s expression when down-spiralling into blissful oblivion. Cheeks ruddy like twin lanterns, eyes almost closed, head thrown back and lips parted in a gasp, a wordless litany. Beautiful. The detective thought, and he had to bite his lip as his own release hit him like a truck, trying not to scream. In the darkness of Greg’s bedroom, his spine was a perfectly taught bow, luminescent and fluid.

 

_Wonderfully, powerfully, **beautiful.**_

  


****

 

John and Mycroft took their time.

In contrast to Greg and Sherlock’s rather hasty descent into coupling, the army doctor and the elder Holmes found themselves falling into the rather shy pattern of getting to know one another, through coffee and dates and far too many texts to count.

 

Slow, their dance was, but in a way, it was perhaps for the better.

 

Both of them agreed that John should stay in Sherlock’s flat, their mutual protectiveness of the younger Holmes bringing both of them up short just slightly. It wasn’t everyday that John found someone willing to put up with Sherlock’s possessiveness, his idiosyncrasies, but he supposed that if anyone might have been able to, it would have been the man’s older brother.

 

Mycroft, to be fair, was often too busy to make any kind of living arrangement with another person entirely work out. It had been a subject of contention with past lovers, yet John hadn’t seemed to mind. Both were rather used to being dragged out to places at odd hours, forced to work at the crack of dawn or the middle of the night. In fact it made what time they were able to carve out for one another all the more special, and John soon found his tentative interest in the man slowly thawing, turning into something warmer.

 

As he learned about Mycroft, he began to pick up on things that made the Ice Man human.

 

Mycroft Holmes didn’t blush very often, but when he did, he was entirely too pale to conceal it. John discovered this little secret on their fifth date together, after having gone out for Indian. The food had been perhaps a bit spicier than either of them had expected, and the elder Holmes had made the mistake of biting down into a cloven-type spice that had been mixed into his curry.

The resulting shade of pink that had crawled along Mycroft’s cheeks and his watering eyes had made John giggle outright, watching with amusement as the man loosened his ever-present tie and downed his glass of water in one fell swallow. That he got a front-row seat to watching the bobbing of Mycroft Holmes’ throat had only been an unexpected bonus. When the red-haired government official could breathe again, John was grinning, legs cross firmly to avoid any unwanted attention from his nether regions.

 

Mycroft noticed anyway.

 

On their twelfth date, John discovered that his… partner? Was that the appropriate word?- had a guilty love for old Bond films. This was found out actually in part by Sherlock, who during a rant about his brother’s incompetence (which John endured with mild indignation and a strangely growing annoyance) mentioned that the only reason Mycroft ever wanted to be in the government was so he could rule the world through double agents and spies. That night, John had surprised his lover, having him come over to the flat to find Sherlock conspicuously absent, popcorn by the couch, and the theme of Goldfinger playing on the telly.

 

John hadn’t realised until then how _warm_ Mycroft’s eyes could be until then when his mouth was relaxed in an honest smile.

 

Their fourteenth date yielded more information, the likes of which John was already half-aware of: Mycroft Holmes was shy and somewhat afraid of commitment. For a man usually so competent when it came to matters of his job, the elder Holmes floundered in romantic endeavours, only suave when giving unexpected surprises to John or anonymous tokens of affection. The first time John casually mentioned that the man was his boyfriend in public conversation (well, public as in Lestrade, Molly and Sherlock) Mycroft had seemed completely flummoxed, his expression rather like that of a deer caught in the headlights. Later on, the elder Holmes admitted that he had not thought he had earned the title of “boyfriend” so soon.

 

John’s kiss wiped away that doubt firmly and forever.

 

Mycroft Holmes freckled during the summer.

Not much, and not on his face, but all along his shoulders and thighs ginger spots appeared with the approaching heat, making the man appear as if he were part leopard. John took his time counting them, first with his hands then tongue, paying special attention towards the constellations amalgamated towards his lover’s stomach. Mycroft, hands twisted in the sheets of John’s bed, struggled not to jerk his hips forward, a beautiful flush crawling all the way from the crown of his head to his collar-bones.

 

_A beautiful sight._

 

John thought to himself, before swallowing the man down. The sight of John's lips wrapped around his cock, the soldier laid out flat on his stomach, was enough to bring the Ice man to a keening completion. 

 

Lastly, Mycroft Holmes _loved._

 

This one, John knew instinctively, by the touches the man bestowed on him, by the kisses. By the way Mycroft’s lips found his battle scar, tracing it with his tongue, or by the way the man’s eyes softened towards John even if his face remained impassive. It was in the way that the man told Sherlock off even while indulging his antics, or in the way without thought the man would kill every single person that might dare harm the people he thought of as his family. It was in the way he gave Anthea time off during the holidays, even when he himself had to work. It was in the way that he came home anyway, long after Christmas night had settled in, just so he could curl around John in the darkness of the man’s bedroom and inhale his scent by the crook of his neck. It was in the way that the elder Holmes admitted to John one night while drunk, that he wouldn’t have said anything about his own feelings, if Sherlock had openly forbade it (that confession had made John deeply angry, even if he could understand).

 

Mycroft Holmes loved deeply and without restraint when it suited him, just as much if not more than Sherlock Holmes. It was a love that was all-encompassing, consuming, and when John caught even glimpses of it, it blew him away.

 

Ice Man couldn’t be a poorer description, no.

 

One just had to first get past that first layer of ice, the outer exterior and see, and they’d know.

 

Mycroft Holmes above all, loved.


End file.
